Unicef sets up orphan camps

2007-11-22 12:36

Dhaka - The United Nation's Children's fund (Unicef) said on Thursday it had set up dozens of camps to care for children orphaned by a deadly Bangladesh cyclone.

Child protection officer Shabnaaz Zahereen said many children had lost one or both parents after Cyclone Sidr ripped through coastal and central districts of the disaster-prone country last Thursday night.

Unicef believes the number of children who have lost one or both parents is in the "thousands", with at least 3 400 people confirmed dead and thousands more said to be missing.

The camps were giving the children one hot meal a day and workers were trying to help "reduce their mental stress and loneliness", the officer said.

"This devastating cyclone has destroyed families and many children are not getting care because so many of their relatives have died," she said.

Unicef says about half of the estimated five million people affected by Sidr were children, about 400 000 under the age of five.

The military-led relief effort to get food, water and medicine to victims, however, was making only slow progress, officials said, due to huge difficulties in reaching remote areas.

'Need more food'

Many hamlets had become unreachable after roads were swept away and narrow waterways - the only other way of accessing them - were left blocked by trees.

In some places, people had only received tiny amounts of aid - just enough to keep them alive, officials said.

"We are fulfilling their immediate needs to keep them alive (but) they need more food," said Emamul Haque of the World Food Programme.

Rice would be provided later but at this "critical point" the priority was to get life-sustaining high-energy biscuits to as many people as possible, he said, adding some had already been dropped by the air force with more on their way.

"What we are giving them is not enough. Some people have not eaten for days," said Wahida Bashar Ahmed of ActionAid.

"It is unbelievable how people have been surviving in these conditions. If they do not get timely relief they could die or face debilitating outbreaks of disease," she added.

A week after the disaster, there were fears of outbreaks of water-borne disease.

In some places, people were already suffering from diarrhoea, a potential killer, especially of children.

"Many people have started to suffer from fever and diarrhoea," said Fazlul Haque of Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC), the country's biggest non-governmental organisation.

Paul Edwards, Unicef's head of water and environmental sanitation, said getting clean water to victims was proving very difficult.

"The problem is intractable. Even water purification tablets are no use if you have salty water and so more sophisticated solutions might be necessary," he said.

"The other concern is sanitation because the focus is on water supply. If sanitation gets forgotten, disease is more likely," he added.

- AFP